


daffodil

by novoaa1



Category: DCU
Genre: Dom/sub Undertones, Domestic, F/F, Feelings, Harleen Quinzel Needs a Hug, Light Dom/sub, Living Together, POV Harleen Quinzel, Pamela Isley Loves Harleen Quinzel, Praise Kink, Protective Pamela Isley, Self-Esteem Issues, Spanking, Sub Harleen Quinzel, as in, because theyre soft, but she is! and ivy's there for her, domestic girlfriends, gentle discipline, harleen quinzel has a praise kink, harleen quinzel has self-esteem issues, harley not thinking she's worth much, i might change it back to mature but i wanted to be on the safe side?, im still a firm believer tha tproofreading is for whiners, it's actually really soft, rated explicit for like literally two sentences, so many feelings, will come back and touch it up later
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-03
Updated: 2020-07-03
Packaged: 2021-03-04 22:55:15
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,895
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25044238
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/novoaa1/pseuds/novoaa1
Summary: “Harley,” Ivy stops her, gentle green-tinged hands reaching out to entangle Harley’s pale fingers in her own. Her touch is warm and calming; she smells like cherry blossoms and springtime andhome, and Harley hates herself for indulgin’ it when she knows damn well she doesn’t deserve it. “What do you need right now?”Harley worries her lower lip between her teeth, ducking her head bashfully. She knows the answer to that, and she’s pretty damn sure Ivy knows it, too. But she also knows the way this works—nothing happens unless she asks for it, unless shewantsit.Ivy’s a real stickler about stuff like that—‘consent’ and ‘boundaries’ and the like.(Harley pretends to find it annoying, but she really, really doesn’t.)Or: Harley does something impulsive, then immediately feels bad about it. She and Ivy talk (and other things) about it.
Relationships: Pamela Isley/Harleen Quinzel
Comments: 8
Kudos: 180





	daffodil

**Author's Note:**

> tryna get back into this writing for harlivy where ivy's all gentle top n harley just needs love and someone to show her that love isn't pain
> 
> cause i got that one wip with them i'm trying to make some edits in and then hopefully hop back on 
> 
> n e ways

So, fine, maybe Harley ain’t always the sharpest knife in the drawer when it comes to making smart, non-impulsive decisions that may or may not negatively impact the people in her life who (despite all rhyme and reason) seem to care about her. 

She’s rash, and sporadic, and sometimes ( _most_ times), her not-so-brilliant spur-of-the-moment plans end up getting her hurt… or almost dead… or worse. 

And honestly? She’s made her peace with that. 

Her days are numbered. They’ve been numbered since the day she fell apart: hopped the railing at Ace Chemicals down into a vat of life-threatening toxic waste for an egomaniacal psychopathic narcissist because she really believed, with every last bit of her bleeding heart, that it was for love. That she was doin’ it for _love_. 

She ain’t that delusional anymore. (Or at least, she’d certainly like to think so.)

Wait. What was she talkin’ about again? 

Oh! Right: Numbered days. Bad decisions. A never-ending procession of near-death experiences. 

She don’t mind it all, really. 

It’s her life—the only one she’s got. 

Maybe it won’t be long, but it’ll be _full_ , and at the end of the day, Harley’s inclined to believe that’s all that really matters.

Well, except… except that _Ivy_ doesn’t quite seem to think that way, and Harley trusts _Ivy’s_ judgement a hell of a lot more than she trusts her own. 

Which has always been something of a… _predicament_ between them, ‘cause Harley gotten pretty good at comin’ to Ivy first before she dives head-first into any “shenanigans” (Ivy’s wording, not hers), but at the end of the day she’s still _Harley_ , and that… 

Well. Let’s just say—maybe Harley ain’t the sharpest knife in the drawer when it comes to making smart, non-impulsive decisions, but she knows when she’s fucked up. 

And this, here? Yeah. She’s definitely fucked things up. 

— — 

“What were you _thinking_ , Harley?” Ivy’s tone is flat, saturated with bottled-up anger. 

Still, she’s at least _talkin’_ to her rather than giving her the silent treatment (which Harley really doesn't think she can handle right now), so that’s something.

“I’m sorry, Pam,” Harley apologizes timidly, looking down at her feet. “I really, really am. I wasn’t… I _wasn’t_ thinkin’.”

“Understatement of the year,” Ivy snorts, and Harley feels her body tense involuntarily at the harshness of it. Still, she stays quiet and unmoving—staring down her own milky-pale feet with red-and-green-painted nails (the ones she’d gotten done by that nice lady at the salon) atop the hardwood flooring. 

There’s a long pause. 

(Harley _hates_ long pauses.) 

“Harley, honey, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have snapped at you just now.”

“’S okay,” Harley assures her, lifting her chin to look Ivy in her pretty jade-green eyes. “I deserve it.”

Ivy frowns at that, standing from the plushy green couch cushions and leveling Harley with a gentle look. “No, darling, you don’t.”

“No, Pam, you’re—you’re _right_ ,” she argues, feeling her cheeks heat with embarrassment. "I wasn’t _thinkin’_ , and you’re always tellin’ me I’ll be a whole lot better off if I just stop and _think_ for a second or two, but I didn’t! I _didn’t_ , and I got hurt, and I don’t much mind it when I’m hurt, but I know _you_ don’t like it much when I’m hurt, and—“

“Harley,” Ivy stops her, gentle green-tinged hands reaching out to entangle Harley’s pale fingers in her own. Her touch is warm and calming; she smells like cherry blossoms and springtime and _home_ , and Harley hates herself for indulgin’ it when she knows damn well she doesn’t deserve it. “What do you need right now?”

Harley worries her lower lip between her teeth, ducking her head bashfully. She knows the answer to that, and she’s pretty damn sure Ivy knows it, too. But she also knows the way this works—nothing happens unless she asks for it, unless she _wants_ it. 

Ivy’s a real stickler about stuff like that—‘consent’ and ‘boundaries’ and the like. 

(Harley pretends to find it annoying, but she really, really doesn’t.)

“Harley,” Ivy admonishes, gentle but firm. She’s doing that _thing_ with her voice, the one that practically oozes authority—the kind of authority that appeals so profoundly to Harley’s submissive side in a way that all the yelling in the world never could; the kind that says she’s _safe_ here with Ivy, that she doesn’t have to be afraid to ask for what she wants, because Ivy will never hold it against her. _Ever_. 

“Look at me,” Ivy tells her in that blessedly stern tone of hers, all quiet strength and infinite patience and an unspoken promise lingering heavily in the air between them that’s tellin' Harley it’s okay to be small right now—that Pam can (and _will_ ) be more than big enough for the two of them. 

Harley looks at her. 

“Tell me what you need, pretty girl,” Ivy entreats, and Harley feels like melting at her sugar-sweet words. “I promise it’s safe.”

Harley swallows thickly, willing herself not to choke on her words. “I need you to hurt me, Pammy,” she whispers out eventually, low and soft—like it’s a secret. (In this moment, it feels as though it kinda is.) “ _Please_."

There’s a shift in the air, then—Harley can feel it. A newfound steadiness to the ground which had only moments ago felt for all the world as if it might crumble beneath her feet. Ivy’s presence seems to expand, uncompromising staunchness rolling off her in potent waves, and Harley… well. 

Harley crumples without a moment’s indecision, surrendering to it on the spot—feels herself shrink and shrink and _shrink_ until she's small and insignificant, a mere shadow of the whirlwind five-alarm fire she used to be. (It’s perfect—it’s exactly what she needs right now, and Ivy damn well knows it, too.)

“Go to the bedroom, love,” Ivy says. “I’ll be right behind you.”

Slipping her hands from Ivy’s hold is agony, though the bitter sensation of forfeit is eclipsed quite swiftly with something bigger, something that easily takes precedence over any misgivings she might otherwise be having—a task to complete, a directive to follow. 

She doesn’t need Ivy’s hands to anchor her any longer (though it’d certainly be nice if they would), 'cause she has her instructions instead. Maybe it ain’t quite better, but it’s sure as hell enough—and besides: it ain’t Harley’s job to worry about that now anyways.

Ivy calls the shots; she’s the one who plans it all out in her big, smart brain so Harley doesn’t have to. 

_Ivy’s_ in charge, not Harley. 

(Despite all her bitching, she _really_ likes it when Ivy’s in charge.)

With that thought in mind, she dashes out the living room and zips super fast down the hall despite the resounding sigh she hears behind her (‘cause Ivy never said anything about ’no running’ this time around). 

She’s well through the door by the time she hears Ivy beginning to make her way over: chirping out jovial greetings to each potted plant and vine and the mini Japanese cherry-blossom tree sprouting prettily in the corner (Harley’s favorite); stealing a sip of the lukewarm coffee (plain black, unlike the double chocolatey-chip frappés with extra whipped cream and chocolate drizzle Harley always gets from Starbucks) sitting atop the window sill in a tie-dye-glazed mug Harley made for Ivy at Color Me Mine.

It takes like dirt—sour dirt, but Harley steels herself and swallows it down as Ivy enters the bedroom because it’s Ivy’s cup of coffee and not Harley’s and no matter how disgusting it is (which it really, _really_ is), there’s a comfort to be found in sneaking some of it purely because it’s _Ivy’s_.

“Did you just steal some of my coffee?” Ivy questions suspiciously as Harley turns to face her.

The aftertaste is bitter on her tongue, but she shakes her head anyhow, feigning ignorance. “What coffee?”

Ivy narrows her gaze but otherwise doesn’t respond; rather, she reaches to pull Harley abruptly forward by the hips, crashing their lips together in a hungry kiss that has Harley immediately parting her lips to grant Ivy entrance with a keening whimper, and—

_Shit_.

Ivy pulls back, licking her evergreen lips with a smirk, and Harley knows she’s been caught. “Liar. I can taste it on you.”

Harley pouts. “No fair.”

“I call it like I see it.” Ivy’s sure hands fall from her hips as she turns to grab her coffee from the window sill, and Harley has to bite back a desperate whine from escaping her at the loss. 

Of course, Ivy doesn’t allow her to dwell on it for very long. 

“Clothes off,” she says, coming to lean casually against the dresser just opposite the foot of the bed, both sage-green hands curled snugly around her coffee mug. 

Harley hastens to obey: pulling her tight black crop top (emblazoned with the Batman logo across its chest in bright butterscotch-yellow) up and over her head (she never wears a bra beneath it, ‘cause ‘free the nipple’ and all that), shucking the pair of tiny white jean-shorts (now spattered with blood, most of which isn’t hers) and plain lacey black thong down her pale inked-up legs in a single motion. 

Under different circumstances, she’d tease a little (or a lot)—go all slow and sultry. Swayin' her hips and bouncin’ excitedly on the balls of her feet to make her boobs jiggle and finding a million reasons to bend over in front of Pam-a-lamb just because she can ( _ooh_ , that rhymed)—teasin’ and teasin’ and _teasin’_ till she snaps: throwing Harley on the bed and tearing her clothes off herself and snarling at her for bein’ a tease. 

But alas—this ain’t that. 

Harley knows what’s about to happen (knows ‘cause she freakin’ _asked_ for it in the first place), and it ain’t the time for messin’ around. (Honestly, she isn’t quite sure she’d even _wanna_ mess around right now anyhow.)

This is ‘cause she fucked up, put herself in danger; Pam takes shit like that real serious—and whatever Pam takes serious, _Harley_ takes serious. 

Anyways. 

All in all, she’s naked in a matter of seconds—bloodied clothes discarded in a crumpled pile at her feet upon the hardwood flooring, wide eyes blinking hopefully up at an ever-levelheaded Pam in a rare show of patience, her body bare save for old scars and messy tattoo ink and a couple of angry-looking bruises beginning to form from her earlier, ahem… _activities_. 

Pam watches her for a minute, sipping her coffee languidly even as Harley does her very best not to squirm. 

“You’re beautiful, Harls,” she remarks plainly after a long moment, like it goes without saying. “So very, very beautiful."

Harley watches her set her coffee aside, tries to stop her eyes from filling with tears in the meantime. “Th-Thank you, Pammy.”

“You’re welcome, baby,” Ivy soothes, then moves with purpose past Harley to take a seat at the foot of the bed. 

Harley twitches where she stands, _aches_ to turn and face her—she’s always hated allowing people at her unprotected back, not knowing what’s coming next (no matter how good she is about frontin’ like it’s the opposite). 

But this is about trust, and she trusts Ivy with every last fucked-up broken piece of herself—this is just another chance to prove it: not moving until Ivy says, staying still and quiet and _compliant_ like she’s supposed to. 

“Turn around.” Harley does, feeling her cheeks heat as she struggles to hold Ivy’s cool gaze. “C’mere.” 

As if bound by some invisible tether, Harley approaches on command—slow, modest, _small_. Everything she isn’t—or, at least, everything she _pretends_ not to be—laid bare unto Ivy’s penetrating gaze. 

The next part is like a dream she’s had a million times before—as easy as breathing: situating herself over Pam’s long emerald-green legs, placing her own hands behind herself to rest at the base of her naked spine, letting most all her body weight rest belly-first over a pair of chlorophyll-colored thighs whose strength she trusts a hell of a lot more than she ever has her own. 

A vine curls itself around either wrist, sprouting and thickening until she knows she couldn’t break them if she tried; they encircle her ankles, too—loose enough to allow some wiggle room, but tight and _steady_ enough to keep her balanced. 

She trusts Ivy not to drop her, ‘course—but the vines are a steadying comfort, in small part for their firm grip around her extremities (ensuring she can go totally limp laid up across Pam's lap without a doubt in her mind they’ll keep her there), but mostly because they’re _Pam's_. 

They smell of her, of rich soil and evergreen forests and _springtime_ , affirming ten times over what Harley already knows to be true: that Pam’s got her, that there’s no reason to be a ‘fraidy cat… that she’s _safe_. 

Pam starts tracing patterns on her back with gentle fingers, and that makes it even better—circles between her shoulder blades, well-manicured nails scratching gently over the side of her ribcage, tracing a steady line straight down the curve of Harley's spine with the pad of her finger. 

“Do you know why you’re here, Harls?”

Harley swallows thickly, fighting the urge to squirm on Pam’s lap. “Yes.”

Pam is quiet, fingers still idly tracing soothing figures into her naked back. “Tell me.”

“I was impulsive—"

Pam hums in acquiesce. 

“—and careless—"

Another agreeable hum. 

“—and _dumb_ —"

_Smack!_

A heavy-handed blow falls across her left cheek without warning, pins and needles tingling in its wake—it makes Harley jerk against her binds (not that she gets anywhere, of course), a surprised yelp escaping her at the unexpected hit. 

“ _Ow_ ,” she whines out petulantly before she can think better of it. “What—"

“Call yourself ‘dumb’ one more time—see what happens,” Pam challenges, though there’s a real anger simmering beneath her strict tone that’s telling Harley this _really_ ain’t the time to push. 

“I’m sorry,” she apologizes sheepishly, her face flooding with heat. She rests her forehead upon the snowy-white duvet, eyelids fluttering shut. _Stupid, stupid, stupid_— 

_Smack!_ Another hit, this time to her right cheek—harder than the one before it. (Or maybe that’s just Harley’s imagination playin’ tricks on her.)

“Why are you sorry?” Pam questions sharply from overhead, a clear warning in her tone. 

“Because I called myself ‘dumb,’ and I shouldn't do that.”

“Mm,” Pam agrees wordlessly. Harley has to bite back the whimper that threatens to escape her when Pam's warm palm comes down to massage her stinging cheeks, gradually soothing the burn. “And why shouldn’t you do that?”

_God dammit_. Pam really isn’t lettin’ her off easy this time. (Not that she ever does.)

“Because it’s mean, and I shouldn’t be mean to myself,” Harley says quietly, her face burning against the cool sheets. 

Another approving hum. “And you’re not dumb, are you, Harley?”

Harley grits her teeth with frustration, feeling a renewed surge of heat flooding her face; she feels like an unruly kindergartener being pulled aside by the teacher, having to bite back her pride and say she was wrong for socking Louise Thorisdóttir in the face, even though that bitchy little runt deserved it. 

“No,” she manages faintly through gritted teeth, and Ivy _tsk_ s.

“I want to hear you say it, love.”

Harley bites her lower lip hard, feeling her eyes burn with unshed tears. _Why is this so fucking hard?_ “I… " she sniffles, a wet tear staining the duvet against her face. “I’m not dumb.”

(She’ll be the first to admit that it doesn’t sound all that convincing.)

Still, Ivy seems to take it in stride. (She probably knows it’s the best she’ll be getting out of Harley at the current moment.) “Exactly,” she acknowledges, a modicum of warmth creeping back into her confident tone. “You’re not dumb.” She pauses then, warm palm still tenderly massaging Harley’s cheeks despite the sting having long since abated. “Now, let’s try this again, shall we? Why are you here, Harls?”

Harley inhales deeply, steeling herself and willing the tears to go away. _You know this answer_ , that steady voice (the _only_ steady voice) in her head tells her. (It sounds suspiciously like Pam’s.) _You know this one_.

“I’m here ‘cause I was impulsive, and reckless, and I rushed into a bad situation when I shoulda talked it through with you first. And… and I got hurt.” 

“Yes,” Ivy acquiesces, something like pride and a genuine smile audible in her voice. “Very good, Harley.”

Harley has to clench her thighs tightly together at the praise, the genuine note of gratification lacing Ivy’s words—it has a familiar warmth pooling low in her belly, a telltale throb making itself known in her clit, a gush of renewed arousal from between her thighs that threatens to have her dripping down onto Ivy’s lap in a matter of minutes if she ain’t careful. 

Thankfully, Ivy’s generous enough to leave it alone for the moment (‘cause Harley knows damn well there’s no way Ivy doesn’t know exactly what she’s doin’ to her right now). 

“You know your safe word, love?”

Harley resists the urge to roll her eyes at that. “Daffodil.”

“Good.” Ivy sounds pleased. (Harley feels her clit twitch in response.) “Let’s begin.”

— —

**Author's Note:**

> i dont think im tryna do any more parts with this because i wanna write for my other wip with them! (and maybe have a scene like this there) but definitely definitely let me know what u thought
> 
> also i ordered my own copy of harleen books 1, 2&3 by stjepan sejic and cAN WE TALK ABOUT HOW MUCH THE ARTWORK AND THE WRITING AND THE PORTRAYAL OF HARLEY IN THAT SERIES SLAPS? BECAUSE IT DOES
> 
> (my [tumblr](https://psyches.co.vu/) or just search me up @ultralightdumbass to come talk to me there!)


End file.
